I Deleted Instagram From My Phone — Here’s What Happened.

Recently, I gave a talk on how human beings tend to be wasteful when it comes to our most precious resource — time.

Indeed it was the Roman philosopher, Seneca, who once penned that “People are frugal in guarding their personal property but as soon as it comes to squandering time they are most wasteful of the one thing in which it is right to be stingy”.

When I asked my audience to check their daily smartphone screen time, the responses varied from 2 hours up to 5 hours a day.

Upon further interrogation, most of that time was attributable to social media, and in particular, Instagram. One audience member, who complained of being time-poor, ironically managed to spend an average of three hours a day browsing Instagram — equivalent to six weeks a year.

Was their Instagram use relevant to their work? No.

Was it an involuntary reaction to boredom and anxiety? You betcha!

Social Comparison and Instagram Anxiety

Ironically, rather than relieve us of said anxiety, Instagram can create more suffering, stemming from social comparison. People’s subjective well-being has a lot to do with social comparison rather than absolute sums. Most of us would be happier making $60,000 a year…